Two Questions in the Same Room

The conference center ballroom on campus was already filling up when I walked in juggling coffee in one hand and my ID badge in the other. More than 360 faculty members had two days of mandatory workshops ahead of us and summer sitting somewhere on the other side of it.

You could feel the wear of the ending academic year in the room. Graduations, final meetings, paperwork, and deadlines all compressed into the last few weeks. Unless you teach and work year-round like me, then it’s just another Monday.

I’ve sat through enough of these over the years to know how the day usually goes. Some people engage, some check email on their phones, and most quietly hope the hours pass faster than the agenda suggests.

This year felt different. We were heading into a 9.5-hour AI summit, and I honestly didn’t know what to expect.

After several years of AI talks at meetings like this, I came in skeptical. But the keynote landed differently this time as Jeremy Utley, a Stanford guy, was talking about creativity and AI. Somewhere during the morning sessions I realized the technology itself wasn’t holding my attention nearly as much as the questions underneath it.

By late afternoon, the summit had stopped feeling like a conversation about AI.

I sat there thinking about my students entering a profession that may not reward hard-earned expertise the same way it did when I entered it. Meanwhile, half the room talked about prompts and tools and the other half probably wondered quietly what any of it meant for the work they’d already built their careers around.

Somewhere between the second and third session, I realized I wasn’t really thinking about AI anymore.

“What happens when your profession starts changing faster than your identity inside it can adjust?

This question had been on my mind for most of the morning.

I have more in me than I’m currently putting out there. I keep noticing that pull during early morning writing sessions, in conversations with colleagues, and in the yellow notebook I wrote about earlier this year.

A few more pages filled up after that week.

What happens to the kind of expertise you’ve spent twenty plus years building when knowledge itself becomes faster, cheaper, and easier for anyone to reach?

Somewhere in the middle of that day, the two questions started to feel connected.

Could I help people think more clearly about this moment without becoming someone I’m not in the process?.

A friend in education leadership texted me last week. She’s run a health professions education program for the past six years, and lately she feels like the work keeps changing faster than she can keep up with. She didn’t ask for advice, and I don’t even think she wanted solutions.

Mostly, she just sounded tired.

Tired of trying to lead responsibly while the expectations, the technology, and the future of the work all keep moving at once. I understood exactly what she meant.

The drive home after that long week of campus meetings left me with both of those questions still sitting there. The pull to share more, and the wrestle with what sharing even means in a moment where expertise itself feels like it’s being redefined.

I’m not in a hurry to resolve either one, to be honest with you. I’ve found the answer is usually better when I don’t force it.

Which question has been harder to ignore for you lately?

The one about where you’re going?

Or the one about what’s happening to the work itself?

If you want to, email and let me know. Even one sentence is fine. I read them all.

Also, if someone came to mind while you were reading this, feel free to pass it along.

Until next time.